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When the Shadow Is the Substance: Judge Gender and the Outcomes of Workplace Sex Discrimination Cases

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  • Matthew Knepper

Abstract

The number of workplace sex discrimination charges filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission approaches 25,000 annually. Do the subsequent judicial proceedings suffer from a discriminatory gender bias? Exploiting random assignment of federal district court judges to civil cases, I find that female plaintiffs filing workplace sex discrimination claims are substantially more likely to settle and win compensation whenever a female judge is assigned to the case. Additionally, female judges are 15 percentage points less likely than male judges to grant motions filed by defendants, which suggests that final negotiations are shaped by the emergence of the bias.

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  • Matthew Knepper, 2018. "When the Shadow Is the Substance: Judge Gender and the Outcomes of Workplace Sex Discrimination Cases," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(3), pages 623-664.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jlabec:doi:10.1086/696150
    DOI: 10.1086/696150
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    Cited by:

    1. Roberto Asmat & Lajos Kossuth, 2023. "Gender Differences in Judicial Decisions under Incomplete Information: Evidence from Child Support Cases," Working Papers wp2023_2303, CEMFI.
    2. Julia Godfrey & Kegon Teng Kok Tan & Mariyana Zapryanova, 2023. "The Effect of Parole Board Racial Composition on Prisoner Outcomes," Working Papers 2023-011, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    3. Gordon B. Dahl & Matthew Knepper, 2023. "Age Discrimination across the Business Cycle," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 15(4), pages 75-112, November.
    4. Shen, Kailing, 2021. "Gender Discrimination," IZA Discussion Papers 14897, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Ash, Elliott & Asher, Sam & Bhowmick, Aditi & Bhupatiraju, Sandeep & Chen, Daniel L. & Devi, Tatanya & Goessmann, Christoph & Novosad, Paul & Siddiqi, Bilal, 2022. "Measuring Gender and Religious Bias in the Indian Judiciary," TSE Working Papers 22-1395, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    6. Joan Josep Vallbé & Carmen Ramírez‐Folch, 2023. "The effect of judges' gender on decisions regarding intimate‐partner violence," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 20(3), pages 641-668, September.
    7. Gordon Burtch & Alejandro Zentner, 2024. "Gender Bias and Property Taxes," Papers 2412.12610, arXiv.org.
    8. Nicolás Grau & Gonzalo Marivil & Jorge Rivera, 2019. "The Effect of Pretrial Detention on Labor Market Outcomes," Working Papers wp488, University of Chile, Department of Economics.
    9. Raphael Corbi & Rafael Ferreira & Jaqueline Oliveira & Danilo Souza, 2021. "Female judges and in-group bias in labor courts," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 41(3), pages 1313-1321.
    10. Chen,Daniel Li & Graham,Jimmy & Ramos Maqueda,Manuel & Singh,Shashank - DIME3, 2022. "Do Judges Favor Their Own Ethnicity and Gender ? Evidence from Kenya," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9956, The World Bank.

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